During this early beta phase, the primary WisdomSpace service is sharing what we've learned about wisdom community services!

 

We're happy to play a mentoring role as we learn more about the services that can really help wisdom communities the most.

 

In the short term, we expect to develop a low-cost virtual conferencing center which any wisdom groups could use.

 

Longer term possibilities include providing webcast &/or internet radio broadcasting services, wisdom community leader workshops, an online affiliate service for project management & others, and shopping for wisdom community resources.

 

Here is the wisdom that we have to share today in our…

 

 

Wisdom Community Toolkit Detective Report

We're constantly sleuthing out the best networking technology to help wisdom communities communicate and collaborate.

 

We're technology-agnostic. We look for tools that are widely-used, proven performers that are fairly easy to use and that are cheap or free.

 

Several of our circle members and allies are part of the PlanetWork Network, an incredible resource.

 

Our motto is that if your technology works for you, keep using it. You can be part of the WisdomSpace network even if you just have a static website that we can point to. If you want to expand your technology toolkit, here are our words of wisdom.

 

Social Networking (Interactive Website) Platforms

A social networking platform is a collection of databases and features

that allow people to communicate & collaborate. These platforms typically provide a few features such as forums, storing documents, event management, etc. It is very rare for a single noncommercial platform to provide all the features that a community might want to use.

 

We did a social networking platform analysis a couple years ago which resulted in our commitment to using open source technology. We learned that literally no single noncommercial platform provided all the features we wanted, but Drupal came the closest. We selected Drupal and have been customizing it for WisdomSpace use.

 

Drupal has emerged as the leading provider since our survey. The most interesting new provider on the horizon is Zaadz, which is built on the Ruby on Rails language.  We really like  Ruby & Zaadz and predict that they might become the next generation leading platform, but they are literally years behind Drupal  in their lifecycle of developing the functional scope and complexity that it really takes to support live working communities.

 

Virtual Meetings

We are bound and determined to find the best cost-effective means for individual folks to have a multi-sensory experience of gathering online instead of having to physically travel. What's your favorite open source audio/visual conference mechanism? free audio conference service for at least 8 people? Please let us know by commenting below!

 

Internet audio and video broadcasting

We're investigating the cheapest means for groups to broadcast their messages across the internet to a global audience. The best solutions we have found so far include low-cost internet radio broadcasting services (such as Live 365) and Freecast, a Java application that allows free peer-to-peer streaming.

 

Project Management Services

In this beta trial phase of WisdomSpace, we are using Basecamp (www.basecampphq.com), an inexpensive web-based tool for project collaboration and management, to help groups within our communities manage their projects and tasks. Our long-term strategy is to integrate the best features from Basecamp into an open source (Drupal) group management tool.  One of the first groups we are establishing at WisdomSpace is one whose primary task will be to give input to our design team to help develop an open source groups management tool that meets your needs. 

 

Stay tuned for further reports on:

 

·       Conferencing

 

·       Photo Services

 

·       Mapping Services